CORNWALL, Ontario – A hospital stay can be very hard on the patient and also their loved ones. Now, one local resident wants to do her part to make the lives of family caregivers a little bit better while they are at the Cornwall Community Hospital (CCH).
Tish Humphries’ daughter Emma has special needs. She requires full-time care at all times and this past supper, she was hospitalized with recurrent pneumonia.
With the hospital’s new policy of allowing caregivers to visit 24 hours a day, Tish was able to be by Emma’s side throughout her stay. The hospital was able to provide Tish with a chair bed while she was there.
A chair bed is kind of like a fold out couch. It is a comfortable chair that can open into a bed when needed.
During her stay at CCH, Tish met another mother, Christine. Christine was caring for her four-year-old son during his own stay at the hospital, but Christine however, did not have a chair bed of her own.
“Christine could not leave her sone alone and spent the week in hospital with him assisting with his care,” Tish said. “She either slept in his bed with him or sat up in the hard chair in the hospital room. I realized then that we need to take care of the caregivers!! Sleep is vital and sleep deprivation just leads to further stress.”
Tish spoke with the Executive Director of the Cornwall Community Hospital Foundation, Amy Gillespie, who told her that the hospital would need at least another nine chairs in order to meet the demand for them.
This is how Project Silent Night was born. Tish Humphries and her husband Ralph started the Project Silent Night campaign to raise money for new chair beds for the Cornwall Community Hospital over the Christmas season and even kicked off the campaign by donating a chair themselves.
To contribute to Project Silent Night call the Cornwall Community Hospital Foundation at 613-930-4508.
